Chapter 189: We Genuinely Have No Counter to Mammon?
"Hi, excuse me — is this where you're hiring?"
A bright, youthful girl in an extremely short mini skirt jogged up to Mammon's table, voice full of anticipation.
"That's right. Could I get some basic information from you?"
Mammon's smile stayed warm and easy.
"Um... 160. B89—W54—H80."
The girl's cheeks went pink. Her voice had gone shy.
"...?"
Mammon stared at her, ponytail bouncing, with a fully blank expression.
I'm — sorry, are those... are those measurements? Those proportions?
He gave her a brief, instinctive once-over. That can't be accurate, can it?
Behind him, Caitlin's eyes had gone instantly, frostily glacial, fixed on the girl with a chill that could've frozen the campus quad.
Kagura, meanwhile, just looked genuinely confused — she had no idea what the string of numbers even meant.
"Ahem — sorry, miss, that's not what I was asking. I meant your trainer information."
Mammon cleared his throat, gently steering things back on track.
"Oh — oh! Sorry!" The girl's blush deepened further. "I'm Ellie."
"I'm a second-year here at Blueberry, member of the League Club. Currently ranked 43rd. I specialize in Grass-types."
She rattled off her information properly this time, flustered.
"Got it. That's a solid ranking." Mammon's eyebrow lifted slightly. 43rd in the League Club put her solidly in the elite tier of students here.
"So — why apply to us specifically?"
This was, in fact, exactly what Mammon was doing: recruiting, right on Blueberry's campus. He'd already negotiated terms with the school's administration beforehand — a sizable donation, framed as corporate sponsorship, had bought him cooperative access to recruit students through official channels.
"My family's not exactly well off. I heard there's compensation involved." Ellie tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, embarrassed.
"Absolutely. We're always glad to invest in talented trainers, with a monthly stipend attached. In exchange, there'll be some expectations on your end, naturally."
Mammon kept his tone friendly.
"Since you're still enrolled, we can offer 5,000 a month to start. We may occasionally reach out for assignments — if you're genuinely unavailable, just let us know ahead of time."
"Don't worry, the assignments won't be anything difficult. And every completed task earns merit points, which you can redeem for cash, rare items, even Pokémon, in some cases."
"If you're interested, just download our company app — everything's tracked there going forward."
"What do you think?"
Mammon walked her through it patiently.
"I'm in!!" Ellie nodded vigorously, her pretty face lit up with excitement.
A fixed monthly stipend of 5,000, and she was still a student?! 5,000 was enough for ten Ultra Balls!
And she'd only have to take on a handful of assignments per month — she could keep going to school normally otherwise. What wasn't to love?
She remembered her friend Lily mentioning she'd gotten 2,000 a month from this same company. Ellie was getting 5,000 — must be tied to League Club rank. Higher rank, presumably, meant stronger battling ability, which apparently scaled the offer.
"This is the contract. Go ahead and sign — read it carefully first, though. Once you sign, you're officially with the company."
Mammon slid the paperwork across the table.
Ellie picked it up and read through it carefully.
"No need to worry, by the way — we're an ethical employer. Once you graduate, you'll convert to full-time, and the benefits package improves considerably from there."
"Yes, sir! I'll work hard!"
Satisfied that everything matched what she'd just been told, Ellie signed without hesitation, practically bouncing with enthusiasm.
"Welcome aboard, Miss Ellie."
"Thank you so much!"
Once her company app was set up, Ellie bounced off across the courtyard, thoroughly delighted with herself.
...Safety shorts really are one of humanity's greater design failures.
"Alright, you can take over recruiting duties from here, Plumeria."
Mammon handed the desk off to one of the elite officers who'd accompanied him, stretching his arms.
Kieran still hadn't called. No rush, though. Plenty of other recruits worth his attention while he waited.
"Wait — Mr. Mammon?!"
A delighted voice rang out, nearby.
Mammon turned, and there she was — wholesome senior Skyla, beaming at him in obvious surprise.
"Miss Skyla."
"It really is you! What are you doing at our school?!"
Skyla jogged over, genuinely thrilled, clearly assuming she'd misread the situation entirely until confirming it was actually him.
"I started a company. Needed some trainers to help out, so I came by Blueberry to see who I could recruit."
Mammon smiled at her easily.
"Huh? What kind of company needs trainers?" Skyla blinked, genuinely surprised.
This was a world built around Pokémon, sure — but the world of professional trainers and the world of ordinary work and commerce were, in practice, almost entirely separate ecosystems.
Even Silph Co., the company that had pioneered the foundational Poké Ball technology, was — for all its wealth and scale, one of the world's top firms by any metric — fundamentally just wealthy. It hadn't stopped Rocket from waltzing in and gutting it whole in the games, its own president reduced to a hostage in his own building.
That said something. Ordinary commerce and the trainer world were, broadly, two different planets, with the Pokémon League acting as the only real point of contact maintaining order between them.
A lot of corporate employees had once been trainers themselves — but once they took a regular job, they generally said goodbye to that life entirely. Mammon remembered a Gen III anime episode clearly enough — May entering a Pokémon Contest in Kanto, her final opponent a regular salaryman who'd already left the trainer world behind for office work.
Plenty of kids who'd never amounted to much as trainers eventually settled into ordinary careers without a second thought.
But going straight from active trainer life into a job — that was an entirely different proposition.
Mostly because basically no company actually wanted to recruit trainers in the first place. Trainers chased dreams, chased the road, chased whatever it was that kept them traveling. What use was a worker like that to a company? People like that didn't want a salaried position, payroll obligations and all.
"Call it a personal vision, Skyla." Mammon considered the question. "Do you know about Team Plasma? Or the Hunter organization?"
"Um..." Skyla tilted her head, clearly only half-informed — unsurprising, given how thoroughly Clay had always shielded her from the rougher parts of the world.
"Team Plasma is a cult preaching the separation of Pokémon and humans. And the Hunter organization treats Pokémon as nothing but tradeable commodities — they catch them with machines and sell them off to private collectors."
"What?!" Skyla's eyes went wide.
"That's why I started this company — to find people who share my vision. Whenever we identify signs of organizations like these, we move against them. Evil like that doesn't get a pass."
Mammon's voice dropped lower, weighted.
"Mr. Mammon!" Skyla's reaction was immediate, electric. She hadn't expected someone this young to already be carrying out something this important.
"Please — let me join too! I want to contribute!"
Her tone left no room for doubt.
"This..." Mammon affected a moment's careful hesitation. "Assignments might cut into your schoolwork, though."
"That's fine! I came to Blueberry to learn and get stronger in the first place — but if I get to actually fight against evil organizations, I think I'll grow even faster!"
Skyla's tone stayed earnest and serious.
"Alright, then. Just make sure your studies stay the priority."
Mammon let himself appear to deliberate before agreeing.
"You can count on me, Mr. Mammon!" Skyla's whole posture radiated fighting spirit — practically vibrating with excitement, honestly.
For a girl with her sense of right and wrong, fighting evil organizations sounded amazing.
"Sign here, then. Everything related to assignments is strictly confidential — you can't discuss any of it with anyone outside the company."
Mammon produced a contract for her.
This was an unexpected windfall, frankly. A talented girl like Skyla made for an excellent enforcer — couldn't reveal the organization's actual identity to her yet, obviously, but using her against Plasma and the Hunters in the meantime suited everyone's interests perfectly.
Once the timing was right, a little carrot, a little stick, and Skyla would join Rocket proper without much resistance at all.
"Got it! Oh — wait, there's an actual monthly salary too?"
Skyla took the contract, eyes going wide.
"Of course. We're a legitimate operation, you know. Though given you're still a student, you're not technically a full-time employee, so the rate's a bit lower."
"Mr. Mammon, this already looks like a lot of money to me." Skyla stared at the figure on the page — 20,000 — clicking her tongue, charmingly stunned.
Her family was comfortable, sure — her own father literally owned a mountain — but that didn't mean she had no idea what a normal salary actually looked like.
This number was genuinely high. Higher than plenty of full-time working adults earned monthly.
"For a trainer as cute and as capable as you, Skyla, I'd say that's hardly excessive." Mammon's smile stayed easy.
"...!"
Skyla's pale cheeks colored instantly. He called me cute!!
"Mr. Mammon, are you recruiting other people too? I know a few really talented classmates — I bet they'd be interested!"
She'd recovered quickly, eyes bright with the idea.
"Absolutely. The more, the better." Mammon could hardly have hoped for a better opening.
If Skyla considered them worth recommending, it was almost certainly Drayton and the rest of Blueberry's own Elite Four — all genuinely impressive talent.
The corner of his mouth curved upward. The trip to Blueberry was turning out to be very productive indeed.
Once he got back, he'd have Lance and Gladion send people to scout Team Plasma's base location, then deploy this fresh batch of students out there — a low-stakes way to gauge exactly how capable they actually were in the field.
Lilycove City, Hoenn.
"Champion Alder, hello."
"Champion Steven? Your reputation precedes you."
In Steven's office, Steven and Wallace sat side by side, having just connected the call with Alder.
"Champion Alder — I just heard from our League President. Mammon's gone to Unova, correct?"
Steven addressed Alder directly.
"That's right. I'm ashamed to admit it, but our League simply doesn't have the strength to repel Team Rocket on our own. We'd be grateful for your help."
Alder's deep voice carried real reluctance, mixed with no small amount of embarrassment.
He was, after all, a trainer of the previous generation — easily the oldest sitting Champion currently active across any region.
"No need for embarrassment, Champion Alder. I'll be honest with you — if Mammon's the opponent, whether we're there or not might not actually change much."
Steven's tone carried the same weariness.
The Hoenn League President had already reached out to him directly to gauge his thoughts on the matter, and once he'd heard the full situation —
He genuinely hadn't wanted to go.
Not out of unwillingness to help, and not because of some lingering psychological scar from Mammon. The actual problem was simpler.
Was he supposed to throw himself at a man wielding Primal Kyogre?
And worse — as long as nobody had a real counter to Primordial Sea, fighting Mammon directly meant gambling with stakes nobody sane would actually accept.
In Steven's position, he simply couldn't summon that level of resolve. They were talking about flooding an entire continent.
"What do you mean by that, Champion Steven?" Alder didn't quite follow.
"You're aware we already brought in Cynthia, Diantha, and a few other Champions to help against Rocket recently. Honestly — and don't laugh at this — even combined, none of us were a match for Mammon."
"...He's genuinely that strong?"
Alder was floored.
"He is. He's captured Primal Kyogre. The raw combat power alone is staggering, but that's not even the critical piece, Champion Alder — Primordial Sea is the real problem."
Steven's voice went grave as he explained.
He laid out, in careful detail, exactly what Hoenn had faced — and the true scope of Primordial Sea's threat.
"A rain capable of drowning an entire continent..."
Back in his office in the Opelucid League building, Alder felt something drop in his chest. His expression went heavy.
This...
So they genuinely had no counter to Mammon at all? Because Mammon held a literal mutually-assured-destruction card in his back pocket?
How were they supposed to fight Rocket under those conditions? Without accepting the destruction of an entire region as an acceptable cost, was there any choice but to let Mammon do exactly as he pleased?
"There's truly nothing we can do?"
Alder's voice had gone hoarse.
"Not necessarily." Steven considered his words carefully before continuing. "He's not the kind of man who deals in indiscriminate cruelty. He's ambitious, certainly — but unless he's genuinely backed into a corner with no options, I don't think he'd let Kyogre flood the world out of spite."
This was his honest assessment, reflecting on every interaction he'd had with Mammon over time. The man's behavior was brash, certainly — arrogant, even — but it had never carried the signature of someone who'd commit mass slaughter for its own sake.
"Are you sure about that?" Alder still sounded uneasy.
"Absolutely, Champion Alder. I can promise you — nobody understands Mammon better than we do!"
Wallace cut in, supremely confident.
Steven's mouth twitched. He shot Wallace a sideways glance. Where, exactly, did that man find the nerve to say something like that out loud?
"In any case — I just wanted to make sure you had the full picture before deciding how to handle this. The actual strategy is yours to determine."
"If you need us there, Wallace and I are happy to come help."
Steven's offer was genuine — not long ago, he'd received exactly this kind of support from Cynthia and the others. The least he could do was return the favor.
"I think I will ask you to come to Unova, Champion Steven. The situation here is... more complicated than what you're probably picturing."
"Understood. We can be in Opelucid by tomorrow."
Steven agreed without hesitation.
"I'll meet you personally when you arrive."
Alder pulled himself together as best he could, though the newly detailed picture of exactly what Mammon was capable of had only added to the weight already pressing on him.
Team Plasma. Team Rocket. Zekrom. Primal Kyogre.
Alder rubbed his temples, hard, feeling an exhaustion settle into his bones that went bone-deep.
Why, he thought. Why does it have to be Unova that draws the short straw on all of this?
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